The Ellian Calendar
The most widely-used calendar used in Lyzandria is the "Ellian Calendar". No one is quite sure of where it came from, though it is widely speculated that Ellios itself handed down the calendar for mortals to use, though others believe the theory that the calendar had been created by an ancient scholar and astronomer. There are 300 days in the calendar year, split up into 10 months. Months The months are divided into four "seasons", even in places where the seasons are not prominent or recognized, with the transitional seasons of Harvestide and Hearthtide having two months, and the seasons of Summertide and Wintertide having three months. Each month consists of 30 days divided evenly into 3 tendays. The months are based on the moons, Ozmit and Uskil, odd months begins with Ozmit in full moon and Uskil in new moon, and end with Ozmit in new moon and Uskil and full moon. Even months begin and end in opposite fashion. Harvestide (The Time of Flowers) Months: ''' The Harvestide months consist of Flocktime and Greengrass. '''Summertide (The Spell of Life) Months: The Summertide months consist of Goldfield, Midsummer, and Flamerule. Hearthtide (The Season of Rest) Months: The Hearthtide months consist of Brightleaf and Fruitfall. Wintertide (The Hour of Waning) Months: The Wintertide months consist of Darkfall, Deepwinter, and Lightclaw. Season Festivals Four times a year the annual holidays are observed as festivals and days of rest across most every civilized land. Each seasonal festival is celebrated differently, according to the traditions of the land and the particular holiday. The Awakening (1 Flocktime): The official beginning of spring is a day of peace and rejoicing. Even if snow still covers the ground, clerics, nobles, and wealthy folk make a point of bringing out flowers grown in special rooms within temples and castles. They distribute the flowers among the people, who wear them or cast them upon the ground as bright offerings to the deities who summon the summer. Summercrown (15 Midsummer): Summercrown night is a time of feasting and music and love. Acquaintances turn into dalliances, courtships turn into betrothals, and the deities themselves take part by ensuring good weather for feasting and frolicking in the woods. Bad weather on this special night is taken as an omen of extremely ill fortune to come. The Feast of the Moons (30 Brightleaf): This holiday of feasting marks a time of journeys. Emissaries, pilgrims, adventurers, and everyone else eager to make speed traditionally leave on their journeys the following day - before the worst of the mud clogs the tracks and the rain freezes into snow. Wintercrown (15 Deepwinter): Nobles and monarchs greet the halfway point of winter with feasting and a traditional exchange of gifts. It is a day of making, renewing, and fortifying alliances. Some common folk enjoy the celebration a bit less - as it marks the halfway point of Wintertide, with hard times still to come. Significant Days Outside of the four main festivals, every town and hamlet tends to celebrate their own specific holidays and significant dates. Such examples include: The Strathmore Annual Pie Making Contest (23 Brightleaf) The Silkcoast Fishing Tournament (11 Greengrass, 11 Midsummer, 11 Brightleaf) The Io’Nian Graduation Ceremony (20 Brightleaf) A few more prominent and widely recognized holidays do exist though: The Dance of the Sun (20 Flocktime): A traditionally more Elven holiday celebrating what they believe to be the brightest day of the year. Ellios’ Blessing (9 Goldfield): The widely accepted date that Ellios itself last came down and laid foot on Lyzandria. A holy day commemorated to taking care of nature. The Passing (1 & 2 Darkfall): The first day traditionally marks the onset of Wintertide. It is a time to celebrate and honor the ancestors and the respected dead. On the first day, folks bless their ancestors and perform rituals or remembrance. People gather to tell stories of the deeds of their ancestors and of the gods until deep into the night. The second day marks a more informal celebration, as folks tend to sleep in from the previous days late night revelries, gathering again in the evening to celebrate by feasting, dancing, spinning astonishing tales of horror, and parading about in costumes. Date Conventions Ten days comprise a Lyzandrian week, simply known as a tenday, or less commonly, a ride. There are 3 tendays in a month and the days making up a tenday do not have formal names, instead they're referred to by number: first-day, second-day, and so on. If precision is required, the number of days and the number of the tenday are used, as in, "the fourth-day of the first-tenday of Flamerule". Days of the month are typically written as the numerical date followed by the month name, for example, "15 Darkfall" or "15th Darkfall". Informally or poetically this could be spoken or written as "the 15th of Darkfall". The individual days of the tenday do not have names. Hours of the Day Timepieces are very rare, and most people break up the day into ten large slices - dawn, morning, highsun (or noon), afternoon, dusk, sunset, evening, midnight, moondark (or night's heart), and night's end. Dozens of conventions for naming these portions of the day exist and cause no little confusion for travelers. These customary divisions are only approximations, and one person's late afternoon might be another's early dusk. Local customs dictate the general length of each portion of the day. Each of these customary periods lasts anywhere from 1 to 4 hours, so highsun is generally accounted to be noon and an hour or so on either side. Few Lyzandrians have cause to measure an hour (or any length of time shorter than a day) with any great precision. People are accustomed to gauging time by intuition, the movement of the sun, and the activity around them. Two merchants might agree to meet at a particular tavern at dusk, and chances are both will show up within 15 or 20 minutes of each other. In large cities, the tolling of temple bells replaces the more casual accounting of the day's passage. Most faiths and large organizations attempt to measure time more accurately. Acolytes of Eliios watch sundials, carefully adjusted by years of observation of the sun's movements in the sky. Traditionally, the hours are numbered 1 to 12 twice, and the bells sound once for each hour on the hour. "Twelve bells" is virtually interchangeable with "midnight" - or "highsun," depending on the context. Timekeeping There are 24 hours in a day, and time is kept on a 24 hour clock. In Harvestide and Summertide there are typically 13 'day' hours and 11 'night' hours, while it is the opposite in the Hearthide and Wintertide months. The Roll of Years Almost every land and race has its own preferred system for marking the passing years. The majority of Tho’Sal begins its calendar at the founding of Rimegard, The First City, established 1,491 years ago.